Kochi players to be part of 2012 IPL auction

The players' auction for the fifth edition of the Indian Premier League will be held in late January or early February and the teams will play their games on a home-and-away basis with each of the nine franchises playing 16 games.

The change means that the cash-rich Twenty20 tournament reverts back to its original format, where all the teams played each other twice. In the upcoming season, each team is now going to play eight home games.

The nine franchises will go into the auction having an additional salary cap of USD two million to spend on players.

The players from the Kochi Tuskers Kerala franchise, which was terminated by the BCCI in September this year, will be part of the auction, the IPL Governing Council chairman Rajeev Shukla said in a statement.

The decisions were taken at the IPL Governing council's meet that took place in Chennai on Saturday.

The IPL GC has also increased the number of players in each team from 30 to 33. The number of foreign players in each team will be 11 instead of 10 while two more Indian players can be added to each team's roster.

However, the number of foreign players that can be part of the final XI will remain at four.

There will also be an additional four play-off matches, to be held in Bangalore and Chennai, that will take the total tally of matches in the tournament to 76.

The IPL-5 season will commence in Chennai on April 4 and the final will be played at the same venue on May 27, 2012.

James Anderson and Stuart Broad reduced the West Indies to 84 for four at lunch on the first day of the second Test at Trent Bridge here on Friday, as the tourists suffered another collapse.
But Shivnarine Chanderpaul, officially the world's best batsman, was still there on 19 not out after defying England's attack for more than 10 hours during West Indies' five-wicket defeat in the first Test at Lord's.

Murali Vijay became the first Indian to hammer two centuries in the Indian Premier League as Chennai Super Kings stormed into final with an 86-run win over Delhi Daredevils on Friday.
The opener cracked four sixes and 15 fours in his quickfire 58-ball 113 as defending champions Chennai posted a commanding 222-5 off their 20 overs before dismissing Delhi for 136 at the Chidambaram stadium in Chennai.